36 And the food shall be for a store to the land against the seven years of famine, which shall be in the land of Egypt; that the land perish not through the famine.'

At issue is the word וְחִמֵּשׁ, wəḥimēš. The translation given above is "and take up the fifth part," but this is not the only possible translation - as we will see, it could also mean to organize.

"Taking a fifth" is attractive because of what occurs a bit later. During the years of famine, Yosef sells the Egyptians food, eventually in exchange for their lands and their very persons. In Bereishit 47:23-26:

24 And it shall come to pass at the ingatherings, that ye shall give a fifth unto Pharaoh, and four parts shall be your own, for seed of the field, and for your food, and for them of your households, and for food for your little ones.'

26 And Joseph made it a statute concerning the land of Egypt unto this day, that Pharaoh should have the fifth; only the land of the priests alone became not Pharaoh's.

Here it is clear that it means taking 1/5th. On the other hand, if Yosef taxes them 1/5 after acquiring all the Egyptians, how was he able to to tax them this amount before, and what does he (that is, Pharaoh) gain? (Prehaps we can say he instituted/raised taxes temporarily because of state emergency, and later, by acquiring all of Egypt for Pharaoh, he solidified this tax.)

"and let him appoint overseers ... and take up the fifth part":
That the overseers should collect 1/5 of all the crops for the needs of the king
where the general law in other years was to take 1/10
as it states in Shmuel "and your fields ... he will take 1/10."
Now you will take twice that
And similarly did Yosef do at the end (Bereishit 47:26)
"[And Joseph made it a statute] concerning the land of Egypt unto this day, that Pharaoh should have the fifth;"

11 And he said: 'This will be the manner of the king that shall reign over you: he will take your sons, and appoint them unto him, for his chariots, and to be his horsemen; and they shall run before his chariots.

12 And he will appoint them unto him for captains of thousands, and captains of fifties; and to plow his ground, and to reap his harvest, and to make his instruments of war, and the instruments of his chariots.

יג וְאֶת-בְּנוֹתֵיכֶם, יִקָּח, לְרַקָּחוֹת וּלְטַבָּחוֹת, וּלְאֹפוֹת.

13 And he will take your daughters to be perfumers, and to be cooks, and to be bakers.

15And he will take the tenth of your seed, and of your vineyards, and give to his officers, and to his servants.

Ibn Ezra suggests the same:

וחמש. שיקנה החומש
wəḥimēš: that he should take the fifth part.

So too Targum Pseudo-Yonatan says take one part of five.

Rabeinu Bachya and Or HaChayim give both explanations as possibilities.

Let's see what Speiser writes in the Anchor Bible Genesis:

Speiser, Anchor Bible Genesis: composite image

As you can see, he adopts the "organize" translation over the "1/5." I wonder, though, at his labeling of "to take a fifth part" as traditional, as opposed to the view advanced by Ehrlich. What Ehrlich proposes it the same as Targum Onkelos and Rashi say (not to mention Or Hachayim and Rabeinu Bachya), and this is truly traditional - most Jews who study the weekly parsha do so with Targum Onkelos and Rashi. Perhaps one can ascribe this to the desire to be creative and non-traditional, for otherwise what do you have to offer. (By traditional he perhaps means the King James Bible, which translates as 1/5, but still - Onkelos and Rashi are hardly non-traditional.)

pattern: mishna. two explanations: Bar Kappara and Rabbi Laizer. Discuss Bar Kappara. Inspect Rabbi Laizer. Digress to safek vs. sfek sfeka. and then back to Rabbi Laizer. Then dispute between Chavrayya and Rabbi Yossi about why not to do nisuin on Friday or motza`ei Shabbat. Proof to Chavraya, digression to Shmuel and discussion of Shmuel, and digression of what else not to do on erev Shabbat. Once talking about taanat betulim, discuss petach patuach, and what follows is a list of things related to safak sota.

Wednesday, December 08, 2004

The Rif, at the tail end of Eruvin. He previously explained that he believes (and demonstrates) that the conclusion of the gemara is not in accordance with Ulla, who held that knocking on a door is forbidden on Shabbat. He then writes:

"And we see that a minority of rabbis that hold like Ulla
And they rely on the Yerushalmi
That we are gores there in masechet yom tov:

Rabbi Elazar said: All that produces a sound is forbidden on shabbat.
Rabbi Ilai was delayed in the bet midrash (study hall)
He left to go to his house and saw they were sleeping.
He slept at the gave in order not to knock on shabbat.
And we say also that Rabbi Yirmiyah permitted knocking on the gate on shabbat.
Abbaye {typo for Rav Acha} said to him: who permitted it to you?

And we do not think so.
For since our sugya in our gemara {bavli} permits
It matters not to us that they forbid in the Yerushalmi
For we rely on our own gemaraFor it is later, and they {the amoraim and redactors of bavli} were experts in Yerushalmi more than us
And if they did not establish that this statement of the Yerushalmi is not to be relied upon
they would not have permitted it to us."

Rabbi Shmuel bar Nachman said:
אֵלֶּה תֹּלְדוֹת יַעֲקֹב, יוֹסֵף - "These are the generations of Jacob. Joseph..." (Bereishit 37:2)
{J: It proceeds with the narrative, but Toldot is often used to introduce geneological data.}
It should not have said this
But rather "These are the generations of Jacob. Reuven..."
Rather, what is it teaching us by saying Yosef?
Only that all that happened to this one (Yaakov) happened to this one.
Just as this one was born circumcised, so too this one was born circumcised.
{Both of these from drashot from pesukim. Yaakov from Bereishit 25:27:
וְיַעֲקֹב אִישׁ תָּם, יֹשֵׁב אֹהָלִים. - "and Yaakov was a complete man, dwelling in tents." and Yosef somehow from אֵלֶּה תֹּלְדוֹת יַעֲקֹב, יוֹסֵף. See Yalkut Shimoni Yirmiyahu and Avot DeRabbi Natan 2:5. The Yosef bit seems a bit circular though, if we are deducing Yosef's being born circumcised from this very pasuk!}
Just as this one's mother (Rivka) was barren, so to this one's mother was barren (Rachel).
Just as this one's mother gave birth to two (Yaakov and Esav), so too this one's mother gave birth to two (Yosef and Binyamin).
Just as this one was a bechor (firstborn) {since Yaakov bought the birthright from Esav} so was this one a bechor (Yosef was the firstborn of his mother Rachel).
Just as this one's mother had difficulty in her pregnancy {such that Rivka went to inquire of Hashem why it was so bad} so too this one had difficulties as the time of childbirth {Rachel, giving birth to Binyamin.}
Just as this one's brother {Esav} hated him, so too this one's brothers hated him.
Just as this one's brother {Esav} sought to kill him, so too this one's brothers sought to kill him.
Just as this one was a shepherd {for Lavan}, so to was this one a shepherd {with his brothers the sons of Bilhah and Zilpah.}
This one was hated {Easv bore a grudge, secretly hating Yaakov}, and this one was hated.
This one was stolen twice (Yaakov in reference to Lavan, in Bereishit 31: גנובתי יום וגנובתי לילה), and this one was stolen twice (Yosef describing how how was sold says כי גנב גנבתי ).
This one was blessed with wealth {by Lavan} and this one was blessed with wealth {in Egypt},
This one was out of the land {to Charan} and this one went out of the land {to Egypt}.
This one married a woman from out of the land {all of Yaakov's wives} and this one married a wife from outside the land {Osnat.}
This one fathered sons outside the land of Israel, and this one fathered sons outside the land.
This one angels accompanied him, and this one angels accompanied him.
{Two midrashim: One that Yaakov was accompanied by angels on the way to and on the way from Charan, based on olim veyordim bo as occurs in his dream. Within the text, where he sees angels in his dream on the way there and encounters the host of angels from Hashem on the way back. The second, that the man Yosef met on the way when he searched from his brothers in Shechem were actually three separate angels.}
This one became great by means of a dream {of the ladder, or perhaps one of Yaakov many other dreams,} and this one became great by means of a dream {either Yosef's own dreams, or that of the baker and butler, or that of Pharaoh.
This one, his father in law's house was blessed for his sake {Lavan}, and this one, his father-in-law's house was blessed for his sake {assuming that Osnat daughter of Poti-fera is the daughter of Potifar, and we read that Potifar's house was blessed for his sake.}This one descended to Egypt and this one descended to Egypt.
This one ended the famine {a midrash that when Yaakov came the famine in Egypt ended} and this one ended the famine.
This one sustained others and this one sustained others.
This one commanded {what should be done to his body after death} and this one commanded.
This one died in Egypt and this one died in Egypt.
This one was embalmed, and this one was embalmed.
This one they took his bones out of Egypt and this one they took his bones out of Egypt.

Thursday, December 02, 2004

Why did they do it? Why did Potifar's wife go after Yosef? Why did Korach lead a rebellion against Moshe and Aharon? The obvious answer is for lust, and for want of power. The midrash suggests, in two separate locations, that they were both acting with some foreknowledge, though they did not have sufficient intel.

1 And Joseph was brought down to Egypt; and Potiphar, an officer of Pharaoh's, the captain of the guard, an Egyptian, bought him of the hand of the Ishmaelites, that had brought him down thither.

This resumes the Yosef story where it left off, two prakim earlier. The question is thus, why place the story of Yehuda and Tamar right here, in the middle of the Yosef narrative?}

And for what cause was this narrative juxtoposed with that?Rabbi Elazer and Rabbi Yochanan.Rabbi Elazer says, to connect one descending to another descending.{Either just the words or act - that both Yehuda and Yosef went down - or more likely, that the sale of Yosef, of which Yehuda played a part, causing Yosef to go down to Egypt, was linked with Yehuda separating from his brothers and all these events (including losing his wife and kids, and/or coming to shame).}
Rabbi Yochanan said, in order to link one הכר - "recognize" to הכר.{The brothers, and according to the midrash which links them, perhaps Yehuda specifically, present Yosef's goat-blood-stained coat to Yaakov and ask if he recognizes it, and Yaakov responds by crying that his son has been devoured.
This is in Bereishit 37:32-33:

25 When she was brought forth, she sent to her father-in-law, saying: 'By the man, whose these are, am I with child'; and she said: 'Discern, I pray thee, whose are these, the signet, and the cords, and the staff.'

26 And Judah acknowledged them, and said: 'She is more righteous than I; forasmuch as I gave her not to Shelah my son.' And he knew her again no more.

Here one might say this is to link the two words, but it is also pretty clear here that the aim is to link the punishment to the crime - Yehuda endured this because of what he did to Yosef, and the parallel language tells us this, but just so we don't miss the point, the Yehuda narrative is inserted in the midst of the Yosef one, and indeed just after Yehuda says הַכֶּר-נָא. (It is in fact not just the words, but the deducing something about a person on the basis of objects of that person.)
}
Rabbi Shmuel bar Nachman said, in order to juxtopose the story of Tamar with the story of Potifar's wife.{This is novel. The previous two, who were introduced as the two opposing sides, are all trying to link punishment to Yehuda with what was done to Yosef, with Rabbi Eliezer linking the middle story forward, to the first pasuk of the continuation, and Rabbi Yochanan linking it backwards to the phrase הַכֶּר-נָא. Rabbi Shmuel bar Nachman is linking it forward, but ignoring the issue of the sale of Yosef, focusing instead on two different personages.
}
Just as this one {Tamar} acted for the sake of heaven, so did this one {Potifar's wife} act for the sake of heaven.For Rabbi Yehuda ben Levi said that she {Potifar's wife} saw via her astrology that she was in the future to establish from him a son.And she did not know if from her, or if from her daughter.This is as is written in Yeshaya 47:13: מוֹדִעִים לֶחֳדָשִׁים, מֵאֲשֶׁר יָבֹאוּ עָלָיִךְ - "the monthly prognosticators, stand up, and save thee from the things that shall come upon thee."

13 Thou art wearied in the multitude of thy counsels; let now the astrologers, the stargazers, the monthly prognosticators, stand up, and save thee from the things that shall come upon thee.

{Thus, the astrologers and stargazers are not effective.}
Rabbi Aibo said: מֵאֲשֶׁר - "from the things [that shall come upon you]" {focusing on the letter מ, meaning "from"} and not all the things.

Thus, some of what she saw was true, but she did not see well enough. While hindsight is 20/20, foresight is not always so.

Two final points before we move on. First, where do we see Yosef married to Potifar's daughter? This is a result of equating Potifar with Potifera Kohen On. As we read in parshat Mikeitz, in Bereishit 41:45:

45 And Pharaoh called Joseph's name Zaphenath-paneah; and he gave him to wife Asenath the daughter of Poti-phera priest of On. And Joseph went out over the land of Egypt.--

Secondly, how do we know that she saw this with her astrology? We saw the juxtoposition, and this was ascribed to the cause of wishing to show she was also acting for the sake of heaven, but Rabbi Shmuel bar Nachman was basing himself on a statement by Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi that she saw this with her astrology. The statement in Yeshaya just talks about the limits of astrology, and not about Potifar's wife, though perhaps we might interpret the surrounding psukim to be directed towards Potifar's wife.

The truth, I think, is much simpler. The problems with Potifar's wife begin in Bereishit 39:7:

7 And it came to pass after these things, that his master's wife cast her eyes upon Joseph; and she said: 'Lie with me.'

The translation renders וַתִּשָּׂא אֵשֶׁת-אֲדֹנָיו אֶת-עֵינֶיהָ, אֶל-יוֹסֵף as "that his master's wife cast her eyes upon Joseph," but literally, it means "the wife of his master lifted up her eyes, to Yosef." Thus, the midrash takes the phrase hyperliterally, to mean that she lifted up her eyes to the heavens to see what was destined in the stars, regarding Yosef.

Let us now turn to the second person, Korach. The following, from Midrash Tanchuma on Korach, siman 5, is a drash on Bamidbar 16:7, and specifically on the phrase רַב-לָכֶם, בְּנֵי לֵוִי:

And Korach, who was an intelligent person, what did he see that led him to this nonsense?
Rather, his eye misled him.
He saw the chain of greatness coming from him:
Shmuel who is measured against Moshe and Aharon {J: who, after all, are those who Korach was fighting against.}
As is stated in Tehillim 99:6:
מֹשֶׁה וְאַהֲרֹן, בְּכֹהֲנָיו, וּשְׁמוּאֵל, בְּקֹרְאֵי שְׁמוֹ
"Moses and Aaron among His priests, and Samuel among them that call upon His name..."
And the 24 mishmarot from his descendants who all prophesied with ruaḥ haqodeš.
As is stated in 1 Chronicles 25:5:

5 all these were the sons of Heman the king's seer in the things pertaining to God, to lift up the horn. And God gave to Heman fourteen sons and three daughters.

{J: and the midrash seems to be applying the word חֹזֵה, seer , to all the sons instead of to the father. Many Psalms in Tehillim are attributed to בני קרח - which we can take as the sons of=descendants of Korach.}
He {Korach} said: is it possible that greatness will in the future emerge from me, and I will {now} be lost?
And he {Korach} did not see well,
for his sons did repentance {and did not perish} and {the future great ones} were established from them.
And Moshe saw well.
And therefore {because he did not see well} he {Korach} combined with them on the basis of the statement by Moshe
That everyone {who brought incense} would be lost and one would survive, as it states {in pasuk 7, cited above}: וְהָיָה הָאִישׁ אֲשֶׁר-יִבְחַר יְהוָה, הוּא הַקָּדוֹשׁ - "and it shall be that the man whom the LORD doth choose, he shall be holy."

Where do we see the sons of Korach did teshuva and survived? We read in Bemidbar 26:

9 And the sons of Eliab: Nemuel, and Dathan, and Abiram. These are that Dathan and Abiram, the elect of the congregation, who strove against Moses and against Aaron in the company of Korah, when they strove against the LORD;

10 and the earth opened her mouth, and swallowed them up together with Korah, when that company died; what time the fire devoured two hundred and fifty men, and they became a sign.

יא וּבְנֵי-קֹרַח, לֹא-מֵתוּ. {ס

11 Notwithstanding the sons of Korah died not. {S}

This is taking they pasuk as saying that the sons of Korach did not due but repented at the last moment and survived. They were then the ones that had descendants that became these great leaders and prophets.

{Update Dec 6: I neglected to mention how the midrash gets this idea in the case of Korach.
It is a midrash on the words רַב-לָכֶם, בְּנֵי לֵוִי. The idea seems to be that רַב-לָכֶם, you have great ones to you, in terms of בְּנֵי לֵוִי, your descendants.}

Once again, we have someone who sees the future, but not well enough. In both cases, the people in question acted with the foreknowledge of descendants to come, but they did not realize that these descendants would come from their children.

k - q : kšţym (H) "archers" (=qštym) 611 (4 X). This is a particularly interesting example. The first t became ţ under the influence of the q.15 Then afterwards q dissimilated to k, since as, for example, in Akkadian, two emphatic consonants cannot coexist in the same root. Cf. kşyr "harvest" ( = qşyr) in Elephantine Aramaic (Aḥiqar 1, 127). We may therefore suppose that such a dialect also existed in Palestine/ We may pose the question whether the form tkšyţ is not really tqšyţ "decoration." This form occurs in YFG 106 22,26. See Epstein, MNM, p. 1227.
15 See also in Palmyrene and in TY: qšţym, qštym YFG 181 9,10.

To explain this in simpler terms, Kutscher is discussing the phenomenon of switching off between q and k, that is, ק and כ, in dialects of Galilean Aramaic, and specifically forms that appear in the Vatican manuscript of the Jerusalem Talmud. Here, his example is a Hebrew term, kšţym, כשטים, to mean archers, rather than qštym, קשתים. We would expect the latter, קשתים, because qšt, קשת, means a bow, from which the word קשתים arises. There are two changes here: from ק to כ (q to k), and from ת to ט (t to ţ). This word occurs 4 times on folio 611 of the Vatican manuscript.

Kutscher offers an interesting analysis. First, the ק (q), which is an amphatic version of כ (k), influenced the ת (t), transforming it into an emphatic ט (ţ). This process is called assimilation. Then, since we dislike having two emphatic letters in a single root, the presence of ט (ţ) causes to ק (q) to dissimilate, and lose its emphatic quality, to become a כ (k). The purpose of footnote 15 is to show the intermediate stage, with both the ק (q) and ט (ţ), occurs in Talmud Yerushalmi, in Ginzburg's Yerushalmi Geniza Fragments. For the second transformation, he cites precedent in Akkadian, and also in Elephantine Aramaic - in the latter, the emphatic צ (ş) causes the original ק (q) to dissimilate to a כ (k).

Among other reasons I am interested in this is that I am in the midst of writing an essay for a take-home final in Theoretical Linguistics, and we need to show two concrete example demonstrating the importance of rule ordering. Here, it is clear that the rule causing assimilation must happen before the rule causing dissimilation, because otherwise, we would not have the emphatic ט (ţ) to cause the dissimilation of ק (q).

It is a good article in its own right, and I recommend reading it. A choice quote (bolding mine):

To unpack the absurdities here, it helps to understand what the Geneva Conventions say about legitimate prisoners of war. The basic idea behind granting POW status is that soldiers who surrender or are captured are not to be punished so long as they have behaved according to certain rules--such as fighting in uniform and doing their best to direct their own attacks at enemy soldiers rather than civilians. Part of their protection from punishment is that they not be subject to coercive interrogation; they are required only to give name, rank and serial number. They may, however, be held for the duration of the conflict so that they do not return to the battlefield.

The POW concept is certainly a great humanitarian advance, since the slaughter of captured enemies used to be routine and since it provides some incentive to fair battlefield conduct. But it is a concept in jeopardy thanks to its ostensible guardians at the ICRC. By demanding POW status for un-uniformed combatants who target civilians--in contravention of the plain language of the Geneva Conventions--the ICRC started the fight over Guantanamo by attempting to remove one of the few carrots we have to encourage humane behavior in war.

Now it goes further and demands that these combatants get even more privileges than legitimate POWs. Has it occurred to no one in Geneva that indefinite detention can't possibly be "tantamount to torture" for illegal combatants if it is the expected course of events for real POWs? The prospect of Guantanamo detainees returning to the battlefield is real, and more than two dozen of those already released have done so.

What does have to do with the parsha though? Well, it fits in with a point I was making the other day in a comment on another blog. One of my posts on Vayishlach, about a midrash rabba saying that Dinah had gone out with her arm (or shoulder) exposed, prompted note over the Velveteen Rabbi. In my reply (in the comments), one thing I mentioned was that with Dinah still captive, the brothers can be seen to have been mounting a rescue attempt. The killing of all the men of Shechem rather than taking them captive seems to have been a common aspect of warfare of the time, since they were combatants who would otherwise regroup and attack later. That is, the whole affair need not be spun as an honor killing.

Wednesday, December 01, 2004

As noted in the previous post, Yosef's brothers used Yosef's coat and some goat blood to fool their father into thinking Yosef had died. This got me thinking - how common does mistaken identity come up in Tanach?

A partial list:
Sarah pretends to be Avraham's sister.
Rivka pretends to be Yitzchak's sister.
They angels pretend to be human to Avraham.
The angels seem to be human to the Sodomites, and perhaps Lot.
Lot sleeps with his daughters, being so drunk he does not know who they are.
Yaakov pretends to be Esav via Esav's clothing and some goat skins.
The brothers pretend that Yosef's coat and some goat blood are all that remains of Yosef.
Moshe's sister says she will get a regular nursemaid but in fact fetches Moshe's mother.
Perhaps, when Moshe comes to Midian, the girls he saves think he is an Egyptian.
In sefer yehoshua (9:4), the Gibeonites use old clothing and flasks to pretend they are from far away, so as to make a peace treaty.
In 2 Shmuel 14, Yoav convinces a woman to pretend to King David that she is a mourner.

Update Nov 2 2004: I missed: Tamar pretends to be a prostitute to get together with Yehuda.
Update Nov 14 2004: I missed: Yosef presents himself to his brothers as a stranger - as the vizier, which he is, but does not tell them that he is their brother.
If I missed some, please post a comment!

Monday, November 29, 2004

In Chutzpah! I note that the brothers are shepherding in Shechem, which they had destroyed in the previous parsha. Although Yaakov initially feared a reaction from the neighboring towns, the pasuk (Bereishit 35:5:) tells us that the fear of God was put into the inhabitants of the towns and the hostile reaction did not surface. Here they are, initially shepherding in Shechem, perhaps even the flocks taken as spoils from Shechem, and Yosef has no fear to go to Shechem alone to see how things fare. Also, Tg Yonatan has two points about the sale of Yosef: it being preordained, and being linked to the destruction of Shechem.

In Dibatam Ra'ah, I discuss the word נַעַר as a verb in the second pasuk of Vayeishev, in Bereishit 37:2. The midrash gives three bad things the brothers did, or appeared to do, that Yosef reported - eating 'ever min hachai, treating the sons of Bilhah and Zilpah as servants, and secual improprieties. I show how these might be derived from the pasuk. Finally, Tg Yonatan gives on sin - that he saw them eat the ears and tails separated from the live animals. I give Perush Yonatan's explanation for this, as well as a possible derivation from the text.

In Where Does the First Pasuk Belong?, I note the relationship between the first pasuk which says that Yaakov settled in the land of his forefathers, with a similar statement about Esav in the previous parsha. I suggest it logically belongs to the previous parsha. This may relate to the order of the narrative, such that the story of Yosef actually precedes the birth of Binyamin and thus Rachel's death. Some proofs that Binyamin is not yet born - Binyamin is not mentioned; Yosef is called the ben zekunim - son of old age; and Yaakov asks "will I and your mother bow down before you?" implying that Rachel, Yosef's mother, is still alive. Then, I suggest that the following

In Brand Name Recognition? Or Lack Thereof?, מהר"א אשכנזי, based on Islamic practice, explains Yehuda's command that Tamar be burnt is a command to brand her forhead to label her a harlot. The presence of the mark is the reason harlots would typically cover their faces, and the pasuk says that Tamar did this when pretending to be one.

In A Baaaad Report, I suggest that on a peshat level, rather than דִּבָּתָם רָעָה meaning an evil report, it actually means a report as to how the shepherding is going. Proofs to this effect - nowhere do we see explicitly what the bad things he reported were, nor that the brothers hated him for it. Further, it seems to set up the story such that we understand why Yaakov sends Yosef after his brothers to find out how the shepherding is going - this is his role.

ז וּבְנֵי יַעֲקֹב בָּאוּ מִן-הַשָּׂדֶה, כְּשָׁמְעָם, וַיִּתְעַצְּבוּ הָאֲנָשִׁים, וַיִּחַר לָהֶם מְאֹד: כִּי-נְבָלָה עָשָׂה בְיִשְׂרָאֵל, לִשְׁכַּב אֶת-בַּת-יַעֲקֹב, וְכֵן, לֹא יֵעָשֶׂה.7 And the sons of Jacob came in from the field when they heard it; and the men were grieved, and they were very wroth, because he had wrought a vile deed in Israel in lying with Jacob's daughter; which thing ought not to be done.

At issue is whether the word כְּשָׁמְעָם, "when they heard it" associates with the pasuk up to this point - they came as soon as they heard - or if is associates with the next part of the pasuk - so that they came, and when they heard, they were grieved and very wroth. The English translation above already disambiguates the parsing issue in favor of the former parsing of the pasuk. It also accords with the trup on the pasuk:

The way the JPS translation parses pasuk 5 reflects the way it is most commonly taken. Namely, that he commands them, saying to them to tell his lord Esav something. The message then starts with "Thus saith thy servant Jacob." He then, in private conversation to his servants, is calling Esav his lord, which is strange.

An epistolary formula is one "[o]f or associated with letters or the writing of letters." Thus, he notes that in Akkadian, there is a matching formula to that in the verse. (Well, not exactly. He puts the word speaks in parentheses, where in the pasuk we have the word speaks.) Plus there is the issue of why he would refer privately to Esav as his lord.

He claims that "So say to my lord Esav" is actually part of the message. Speiser's translation is not exactly literal, so it might be worthwhile to show how JPS and Speiser seem to take each part of the verse.

12 be it known unto the king, that the Jews that came up from thee are come to us unto Jerusalem; they are building the rebellious and the bad city, and have finished the walls, and are digging out the foundations.

The way this is parsed in JPS is that (in pasuk 11) 'they sent unto him, even unto Artaxerxes the king.' Then presumably, the letter begings after the --, with 'thy servants the men beyond the River.'

Here, though, we have a duplication. Why say 'they sent unto him' and then 'unto Artaxerxes the king.' The reason the word 'even' is inserted in the translation is to note this duplication. But in fact, if we turn to extrabiblical evidence, we see that this is how letters were addressed.

Thus, if this is so, it should really read: 'This is the copy of the letter that they sent to him: To Artaxerxes the king, the men of [the province] Across the River, and now.' In fact, this is how Jacob Myers translates the pasuk in the Anchor Bible Ezra-Nechemia, pg 31, without even noting in a note or comment that he is doing this.

I do not beleive that this was necessarily not known to Chazal, even though Speiser credits Ehrlich as his source for this explanation. In fact, we might surmise as much from reading midrash rabba on this week's parsha. Yehuda Nesia sent a letter to the Roman Emperor Antoninus, with whom he was friendly. (Now, elsewhere in midrash rabba for this sedra, there is an idea to use Yaakov's interactions with Esav as a template for how to interact with the Romans.)

'And he commanded them saying, so say to my lord Esav'Rabbenu said to Rabbi Apas:'Write a letter from me (lit. from my name) to my master the king Antoninus.'He (R Apas) got up and wrote: From Yehuda Nesia (the Prince) to our master the king Antoninus.He (Yehuda Nesia) got up and read it and tore it up.He (Yehuda Nesia) said 'Write: From your servant Yehuda to our master the king Antoninus.'He (R Apas) said, 'Rebbi, for what cause do you degrade your honor?'He (Yehuda Nesia) said to him, 'What, am I better than my ancestor?! Does it not say: So says your servant Yaakov?'

Thus, Yehuda Nesia considers the message sent from Yaakov to Esav to be epistolic in nature, or at least a basis for an epistle. Note also that while the order of the sender and sendee is reversed, he still includes both components, and 'our master the king Antoninus' parallels 'my lord Esav.' The only thing at issue was how to refer to himself.

So, while not a clear-cut case, it appears that Yehuda Nesia may have parsed the pasuk the same way.

Now, on to the issue of the trup. Speiser noted that his reading was against the traditional accents. If so, I would guess this would be true for the pasuk in Ezra as well.

Note in both cases the etnachta (֑) is the accent that breaks the pasuk in twain. It appears on לְעֵשָׂ֑ו, to Esav, in Bereishit and on מַלְכָּ֑א , the king, in Ezra, thus appearing to break up the verse as in the JPS. Thus, in Bereishit, the "say to Esav" is divided from the rest of the message and the "so says your servant Yaakov," and in Ezra, the "unto the king Artaxerxes" is divided from the rest of the message and from "your servants on the other side of the river."

We would presumably like the division after the word לֵאמֹר in Bereishit, and after עֲלוֹהִי in Ezra.

However, the cantillation can be misleading in this regard, and you really need to know a lot about trup before you can make a statement that a reading is against the trup. In this case, it is advisable to see what one of te definitive books on trup has to contribute to the matter.

III. α, It is on the same principle that the introductory part of the verse, although logically requiring the main accent (Athnach) after it, is constantly passed over, that this accent may be introduced where the weight of the meaning of the passage seems to lie. Observe the division in the following instances:

…

(page 35)

β. Particularly noteworthy is the way in which the words that introduce a speech – or anything similar, as a command, decree, oath, covenant, &c. – are treated. They constantly occupy a subordinate position, as far as the accents are concerned. The clause containing the speech itself, the command, &c, is counted the more important, and receives the main accentuation. In short, the division is made (as above) just as if the introductory words were absent, e.g.

‘And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.' (Gen. i. 6). 'And the LORD said unto him: Therefore whosoever slayeth Cain, vengeance shall be taken on him sevenfold.' (Gen iv. 15). {J: The pasuk continues. Also, I took JPS's 'the LORD' in place of Wickes' writing of the name, and will do so in the other examples as well.}'And Moses said unto the children of Israel, 'See, the LORD hath called by name Bezalel the son of Uri, the son of Hur, of the tribe of Judah. (Ex. xxxv. 30)The Lord GOD hath sworn by His holiness, Lo, surely the days shall come upon you, that ye shall be taken away with hooks, and your residue with fish-hooks. (Amos iv. 2).'...and commanded to destroy all the wise men of Babylon.' (Dan.. ii. 12).' Thou, O king, hast made a decree, that every man that shall hear the sound of the cornet, ..... and all kinds of music, shall fall down and worship the golden image' (iii 10).

Such cases occur in every page.

Since these are words that introduce a speech, we would not expect to find the division on the word introducing that speech, but a bit later. Thus we should not expect it on לֵאמֹר but rather later in the actual message, and we should not expect it on עֲלוֹהִי but rather later, in the actual message. In fact that is where we find it, within the address: after 'So say to my lord Esav' and after 'to the king Artexerxes.'

Perhaps once we delay the etnachta from the word לֵאמֹר we would like to have it even later, so as not to divide the first part of the address from the second, but (one could say) this is already a syntactical and semantical division, since after all, even though it is part of the message, it is a command to relate the following message to the recipient.

2 And Shechem the son of Hamor the Hivite, the prince of the land, saw her; and he took her, and lay with her, and humbled her.

Which may be translated: And he saw her shoulder (shechem), did the son of Chamor. (As one perush explains, the prompting for such an interpretation is the word order - it might have placed שְׁכֶם בֶּן-חֲמוֹר before the word אֹתָהּ. That these are forced together prompts an additional reading of the pasuk bearing this meaning.)

If so, it would appear that she had her entire arm exposed, not just her elbows.

On a related note, a few weeks ago, in Pastoral Psychology, the professor told us about an Israeli Assessment test for children that had been translated into Yiddish for chareidi children. Some of their answers differed from the one that was expected. For example, they were asked what the following things had in common: knees and elbows. They were expected to say that they are both joints, but the answer the chareidi kids all gave was that they are both something that must be covered. :)

Update: This has turned into a fairly popular post. Hooray! :) To all visitors coming from Velveteen Rabbi, I'd like to clarify that I wouldn't categorize my post as advocacy - more along the lines of observation and analysis of the textual basis for the specific midrash in midrash rabba. Also, while you are here, why not take a look around?

In "Dual Etymologies for Names" I discuss how various place names seem to have more than one reason for their naming. Specifically, מחנים (in the dual form), named at the end of Vayeitzei, is so named because Yaakov sees a single encampment of angels. But then we see in Vayishlach, shortly afterwards and in the same location, that he splits his family into two camps. I discuss a midrash on the matter in Tg Yerushalmi, and the Scriptural basis for the midrash. Tg Yonatan, Rashi, and Ramban seem to take on the issue of why there is a dual in מחנים.
Another dual place name in Vayishlach is Penuel, which Yaakov first names for having seen God face to face and living to tell the tale, yet later he uses the term to say that seeing Esav's face is like seeing that of God.
Also in Vayishlach is Bet El, which Yaakov seems to name multiple times, but I claim the psukim are speaking in the pluperfect, and he only names the place one time.

In "Dual Etymologies for People's Names" I treat dual etymologies for people rather than places as I did in the first post. Turning to Vayeitzei, I find dual etymologies for Yosef and Yissacher, and give possible explanations for this.

In "Shnayim Mikra VeEchad Targum?" I discuss two psukim that have only a single targum, and how the trup is constructed so as to omit the translation in shul. It is a pasuk about Reuven and Bilhah.

In "Commentators Who Live In Glass Houses?" Ibn Ezra takes a contemporary, Yitzchaki, to task for kefira in the dating of the psukim about the kings of Edom. I show how Ibn Ezra's approach differs from Yitzchaki.

Reuben, thou art my first-born, my might, and the first-fruits of my
strength; the excellency of dignity, and the excellency of power.

Additionally, this might be a dialectal difference - we must recall that Rachel was from Charan, and the daughter of an Aramean, so she might give an Aramaicized name in his name, where as Yaakov would speak Hebrew, and would give the Hebrew. (If so, it is an Aramaic cognate Yaakov uses in Bereishit 49)

Something akin to this is in fact suggested by the midrash rabba on Vayishlach. They say that בֶּן-אוֹנִי is בר צערי, the son of my affliction, in Aramaic, and Yaakov gave him his name in Hebrew. Thus a linguistic difference based on place of origin, but also a different meaning. (One perush brought down in the likut on the side suggested, citing eventually Rashi, that they both mean strength, but she meant the strength of the difficulty of her childbirth, and Yaakov spun it in a more positive direction, strength in general. I would note that, with a bit of forced reading (perhaps made easier if there were some variant text) the midrash might be parsable to take the בר צערי as one explanation, and the Aramaic/Hebrew variation as a second perush, in which case it would be exactly what I initially suggested above.)

Update: My wife Racheli pointed out the parallel to the naming that occured in the previous parsha, Vayeitzei. Lavan pursues Yaakov, and in the end they make peace. We read, in Bereishit 31:46-47:

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parshablog is published by (rabbi) josh waxman (joshwaxman [at] yahoo [dot] com), a grad student in Revel, a grad student in a Phd program in computer science at CUNY. i recently received semicha from RIETS. this blog is devoted to parsha as well as whatever it is i am currently learning.